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Summary
Nathaniel Wesninski was eight years old when his father sold him to the Moriyamas.
At the Nest, he learns quickly what survival really costs: obedience, silence, and the careful art of not breaking where anyone can see. Tetsuji’s attention is suffocating, Riko’s promises rot into something sharp and cruel, and the only thing Nathaniel is allowed to keep is the quiet certainty that none of this is love — even when part of him still wants to believe it is.
Years later, one broken hand and one brutal night are enough to push everything past the point of return. Nathaniel gets Kevin and Jean out.
Nathaniel stays behind.
By the time he finally crawls his way to Palmetto State, he is more scar tissue than person, terrified of hands, of men, of kindness most of all. The Foxes think they’re getting a quiet striker with a bad attitude.
What they get instead is someone who was never meant to survive the Nest — and did anyway.
But the past doesn’t let go easily.
And Nathaniel has never learned how to be loved without bleeding for it first.